So – am I managing my time wisely? Hard to say. The very fact that I’ve been completely silent for almost an entire month would lead me to believe that I am not focusing on what I want to focus on. So what caused the silence? What caused the dry spell? What was it that kept me from taking forward steps in this IM Journey of mine?

I’m trying to come up with a completely honest and legitimate answer to those questions. A part of me wants to say I’ve just been so busy and that I’ve just had so much to do. I think the truth is that for the last month, I got really lazy. Not lazy in everything…just lazy in Internet Marketing. I think what happened was that I got overwhelmed with the next step of keyword research and suddenly became convinced that I wasn’t going to be able to do this and made my offline work my excuse to not do this.

That’s the bad news.

The good news is I’m not throwing in the towel.

I finished reading that book I talked about a couple of posts ago (about time management). I actually finished it quite some time ago. I think there was a lot that I took from that book. I really feel like I started making some forward progress on my productivity and my time management at work. The thing is I was working so hard on trying to establish those habits (which I haven’t done 100%, but I have made some good progress), that by the time I came home, I just didn’t want to focus anymore. I wanted to veg out. I wanted to take a brain vacation and not think about ANYTHING.

That’s all well and good, but not very productive from an IM stand point, now is it? Now, I have been completely stagnant for so long that I’ve lost time, money, and ALL forward momentum that I had. The worst part is that I very seriously (no excuses here!) will have very little time to do much of anything dealing with internet marketing for the next week or two. I suppose I need to make every minute count that I can.

So, anyway, I just wanted post an update to explain what’s going on with me lately. I’ll get my forward momentum back, but it may take a little bit (considering my offline job will be taking an extraordinarily larger chunk of my time over the next couple of weeks). Don’t lose faith in me yet! You’ll soon hear me making victorious proclamations!

It’s time for me to break the silence! Oh, wow! It’s been an incredibly busy week for me off-line. I have been getting home later than usual and the whole nine yards, so that’s why I have been inactive. As much as I’ve been pretty irritated by that fact, the truth is that when you’re starting out like me, part of the point is that you’re able to do this in your spare time…which is something I haven’t had much of in the past week.

The next week is looking to be pretty busy for me as well. But…I MIGHT have my evenings to myself, though I’ll be having to get to bed early since I’ll be getting up between 3:15 and 3:30 every day. Oh, how I dread days like that! But, as long as I’m working for someone else, I suppose I need to do what they need me to do, right?

But, this post isn’t going to be completely void of possibly meaningful information. I started reading a book this week (at the suggestion of my boss) called Time Management: Proven Techniques for Making the Most of Your Valuable Time by Marshall J. Cook. (No affiliate link there, guys! – I haven’t gotten that far yet!) Anywho…I’m about 93 pages into this 222 page book (sans index!) and so far, I’ve found it rather enjoyable. I’m surprised by that because I don’t typically like books like that, but it’s surprisingly easy to read and relate to and the information and suggestions make a lot of sense to me.

So far Marshall J. Cook has talked to me (through his pages) about the fact that you can’t find any more time in your day. In order for you to do something new, something old has to be sacrificed. For example, if you want to add exercise into your daily routine, SOMETHING has to be moved out – either that extra 30 minutes of sleep, or that time in front of the TV or whatever else it is that fills up your 24 hours each day. (This isn’t the only thing I’ve read in 93 pages…but it’s what I’m choosing to blog about.)

I guess the timing of starting to read this book is one of the reasons I find it so compelling. As you all know by now, I am “just starting” in Internet marketing. OK, so this blog has been up for a couple of weeks now, but so far I haven’t done anything related to Internet marketing other than what you’ve seen so far. (nope, I haven’t started my keyword research yet, Anna! But I will, I promise!) But one thing I noticed when I got started doing this was that I started watching a significantly smaller amount of television. Hi, I’m Dustin and I’m a TV junkie.

Television allows me to escape from the day and laugh at those people whose lives are written by other people. Unfortunately, it’s not a very good way to spend my time…not a whole lot can be gained by watching hours of TV every week. Now – I’m not saying that sitting in front of the computer instead is the BEST alternative, but at least I’m trying to accomplish something here. The only thing I’m trying to accomplish when I’m in front of the TV is…well…nothing! Since I started this blog I have had my mind actively engaged and have been expanding my social circle. Not only that but I’m working on building a foundation for myself where I can make money online. I have hardly watched much TV at all in the past 2 weeks!

I have got a busy weekend ahead of me. I intend to spend some time today catching up on the blogs I have started reading. Then I plan on reading more of this book and then starting on some keyword research. Pending any other off-line issues and errands that come up, I should start making some actual IM progress this weekend!

Oh, and I know some of you might we waiting to hear about my goals. Just as I haven’t done anything else with my blog, I haven’t done the goal thing yet either. But…while I do think I need to figure out what my goals are. I think I’ll probably start with broad goals and work my way to more finite goals. But whatever I do there, I am going to take some advice I got and not let the act of setting goals (which is difficult for me to do) impede my progress as an internet marketer.